


Orpheus's Letter

by RationalNumber



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, Drama, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-01
Updated: 2020-11-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:47:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27327550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RationalNumber/pseuds/RationalNumber
Summary: On the eve of the twins' birthday, Miya Osamu finds his way back to the place he grew up with his brother and reminisces all their moments together, wondering when things changed in such a way it tore their world apart.
Kudos: 20
Collections: Haikyuu Angst Week 2020





	Orpheus's Letter

_“And once again, the Miya twins prove that the Inarizaki’s must be feared with that whopping set to straight!”_ The announcer’s voice echoes from Osamu’s phone, the little screen showing him and his brother standing side by side, the blonde wearing his usual arrogant smirk.

The wind blows Osamu’s now jet-black hair, and his eye catches some dust which makes him blink a couple of times. He hugs his coat tightly, his muscles shivering after time has slowly worn it away. 

  
It seemed like yesterday when he and Atsumu had the world in their hands, like how they moved the volleyball with their hands to countless victories nationwide.

  
Oh, how fast things could change.

  
Osamu’s phone vibrates and he mindlessly turns the alarm off, completely aware of what his itinerary was for the day. He fishes his car keys from his coat pocket and starts his journey to that place they once shared—Their old house.

  
It had been two years since they had moved out of their prefecture, for reasons both good and bad. Yet Osamu could not find himself completely forgetting the place, so he visits it at least once per year.

  
The drive took Osamu to memory lane, the scenery outside his car window reeked both of familiarity and something completely unknown. He sees the onigiri shop he used to drag Atsumu to taste their products and spend the rest of the time going home, thinking of how to replicate the taste.

  
_“Yer’ just wasting food you know ‘Samu? You’ll never get the taste right.” Atsumu would say, his arms propping his blonde head as he observed Osamu making onigiris._

  
_“Shut up, I’m so close. If only I knew what kind of eggs they use, I just can’t get the consistency right.”_

  
Atsumu would be the one who would critic his onigiris most, even to a point where they would get physical when one’s insult would cross a line. Yet his brother was also the same man that tasted his dishes when no one would dare wait a thirty-minute queue for his food.

  
_He believed in me, just as I believed in him._ Osamu thinks to himself as he turns the vehicle to their block for a playground to greet him. The kids had long gone home since the moon had risen, so Osamu took the liberty of parking the car to stroll for a bit.

  
His mind takes him to a childhood memory, casting illusions of two black haired boys running around the park.

  
_“Hey Samu! Let us see who can climb the top of the slide faster!” His brother, filled with energy on any time of the day challenged him, running towards the slide set._

  
_Osamu being the one who moves the least out of the twins, was already panting from all their running, but still he followed suit. The lethargy making his legs feel like it was made of wet sandbags._

  
_Taking a clumsy step on the stairs, he trips and falls, scraping his knee on the process._   
_“Samu!” Atsumu yelled, already on the top of the slide set. He hurriedly slid down and ran to Osamu who was already crying._

  
_“Tsum -tsum, mom is gonna kill me. She let us play on the condition we wouldn’t get hurt!” Little Osamu said in between sobs._

  
_He blew some of the sand off the scar and hoisted Osamu up. “Come now, we need to wash that wound of yours.” Atsumu said as he flashed his twin a comforting smile._

  
The imagery in front of him flickered, like a movie that had run out of tape, before completely disappearing, leaving Osamu standing in the middle of a deserted playground.

  
“Where are you now that I need your comfort Tsum-tsum.” Osamu whispers to the night as he walked away.

  
He had decided not to take the car but instead travel the remaining distance from the playground to his house by foot. His mind playing various images of him and his brother laughing, fighting, talking…—Memories of them living the best time of their lives, naïve to the harsh realities of the world.

  
Finally, he had made it to the outside of their previous house. The shrubs adorning the walls had dug some of its roots to the walls. Osamu thinks he would have to clean them later, maybe give it a new paint job to make it look somehow presentable.

  
He rummages for his keys and enters the gate, the loud screeching sound of a rusty hinge echoing through the night. The grass on the lawn had grown once more, some of the prickly edges scratching Osamu’s legs as he made his way to the door.

  
He opens it and a cold breeze hits his face, sending a shivering sensation in his body. He navigates the dark to locate the main switch and flicks it open, the lights inside illuminating the home they used to live in.

Dust had accumulated on the furniture covers, but everything was still in the same way they left it.

  
Osamu sighed and started cleaning the first floor of their house, taking a good hour or two in doing so. He washed the rice cooker he used to cook rice for his onigiris and opened the cupboard to get the container of rice he purposely left there from the last year he visited. 

  
He prepared one cup of rice to cook and placed it in the machine, a loud click echoing in the empty house. 

  
Osamu started climbing the stairs, looking fondly at the pictures hung on the wall of him and his brother from the time they were just born up till their last volleyball match together in high school.

  
His footsteps creaked against their wooden floor as he made his way to Atsumu’s room stopping just at the door. The slab of wood was adorned with multiple stickers related to volleyball, from their jersey number in Inarizaki and the number Atsumu wore when he got into MSBY Jackals.

  
Osamu thought of one of his greatest what if’s that was still boggling him up till the present day. What if he had never left Atsumu’s side in the volleyball court? 

  
But he already had his answer waiting for him behind the closed door.

  
Slowly, he turned the knob and opened the door, the strong smell of medicine and antiseptics greeting his nose, reminding him of what had happened on the four corners of his brother’s room.

  
It was supposed to be a big match for Atsumu that day, they were facing the Adlers, and his brother was talking non-stop about how he and Shoyo had been spending the last months training for this match to happen.

  
_“I really hope I can see that Kageyama again Samu’ then I’ll shove in his face that I’m the best setter there is! He’s no King of the Court!”_

  
_Osamu laughs as he puts his apron aside, placing some freshly made onigiris on the table._

  
_“Eat first then, you’ll need your strength for the match.”_

  
_“Thanks Samu’ yer’ the best.” His brother replied, chowing down the onigiris silently, finishing it in a matter of minutes._

  
_“I have to go now! Wish me luck!” Atsumu said as he hurriedly grabbed his duffel bag, hurriedly making his way towards the door before stopping and turning back._

  
_“Gimme my good luck hug.” Atsumu said as he walked towards Osamu who had his arms wide open._

  
_But instead of getting an embrace, all Osamu heard and saw was the loud thud of Atsumu’s unconscious body hitting the floor._   
_\--_

  
_“Cancer of the bone marrow, stage three.” The doctor said as he looked at Atsumu’s charts._

  
_His mother couldn’t help but cry, clinging to their Dad’s shoulder who was wearing a face of mixed disbelief and despair._

  
_Osamu stood there, numb, unfazed. The doctor’s words weren’t really clicking in his mind. Atsumu? Cancer? How? He was the healthiest person he had known, he never let his health get into such a dire condition._

  
_“I’m actually surprised he could still play with his condition, considering the affected area was his hip, it must’ve hurt.” He adds before leaving to tend to other patients._

  
_Osamu looked at the glass window to see Atsumu peacefully sleeping. Unbeknownst to him, tears had already started flowing on his cheeks._  
\--  
Osamu walked inside the room and saw the faded pictures Atsumu posted on his wall with their old high school volleyball team, up till the last days of his career.

  
He uncovered the bed and laid down, the warmth of the mattress enveloping his backside. The glow in the dark stickers he had bought for his brother still on the ceiling, though some had already lost their light. He remembers of the day he bought it for him, MSBY had just announced his early retirement, though the reason most people know was due to personal affairs Atsumu needed to tend to.

  
Hundreds of flower bouquets and volleyballs were sent by his fans as gifts that they had to give some of them to local high schools in need of it.

  
Osamu had found his brother on his room lying on his bed, throwing a volleyball towards the ceiling and catching it.

  
_“Do you need something Tsum-tsum?”_

  
_“I want to go outside Samu. I’m sick of being cooped inside. I want to see the stars.” Atsumu weakly said as he rose to a sitting position, the intravenous device in his chest popping out of his now loose volleyball shirt, the muscles in his arm had shrunk due to slow atrophy as he moved less and less with each passing day._

  
_“You know how mom and dad would react to that. But… maybe they’ll agree if we go somewhere near?”_

  
_Atsumu’s face brightens up, a smile forming in his face, though not the usual ones he shows back then._

  
_“Get your coat then, we’re going to the park.”_

  
_Atsumu grabbed his Inarizaki jacket and wore it hurriedly, Osamu leaning on the doorway, observing his brother._

  
_“Say Samu, you think we can pass by that stationery store down the block? I want to put them glow in the dark stickers in my ceiling ya know? Makes me less lonely at nights.”_

  
_A pang of pain resonates in Osamu’s heart as he nods turning away to wipe a tear that had managed to escape his eye._

  
_The usual 10-minute walk to the park had been prolonged to thirty minutes with Atsumu’s now slow pacing. By the time they arrive, the sun was already starting to set and kids were starting to go back to their homes to wash up for dinner._

  
_“Ah, to be young.” Atsumu sighs as he slumps into the bench, heaving a sigh of mixed relief and tiredness from their long walk._

  
_“What are you talking about? We’re still on our twenties, we’re technically young adults.”_

  
_“Exactly.” Atsumu trails off, his eyes taking a sullen expression, “But why does my body feel like it’s like a grandpa now Samu? I want to run ya know? Feel the wind in my cheeks. I wanna jump again, without fear of my damned hip acting up and killing itself along with me in it.” Atsumu whimpers, tears flowing on his face._

  
_“I still want to live Samu. I still have so much things to do.”_

  
_Osamu did what any rational person would have done, he pulled his brother to an embrace and let him cry his heart out, letting his own tears flow in silence, contrast to his twin’s loud cries._

  
_“How did things change like this all of a sudden?” Osamu asked no one in particular._

  
In the end, they couldn’t buy the stickers since the bookstore had closed for the day, so Osamu ended up buying it for his brother and sticking them in the wall.

  
It didn’t take that long when Atsumu’s cancer took his ability of walking, and when it happened, Osamu couldn’t look his brother in the eye. His cheeks had sunk from all the sleepless nights he had to suffer because of the aching in his lower appendages, his lean figure that emanated strength was reduced to the paper-thin man that he was now.

  
Atsumu’s mom and dad tried their best to face their sons with smiles on their faces, like everything was normal, like nothing had changed. But every day was harder for them, occasionally they would make the mistake of breaking down in tears as they tended to Atsumu and would rush outside crying. Osamu would then have to take responsibility to finish what they started.

  
But it was hard for him too. Countless of times he wished he could cry in front of Atsumu but he stopped himself. _For countless of times he had saved me from despair, now is my time to be strong for him. For Tsum-tsum._ He would recite over and over as he tended to his brother.

  
One night, while Osamu was cleaning Atsumu’s room, his brother gave him a weird request of reading him a story, specifically of Orpheus and Eurydice. When asked why he requested for such a story, Atsumu struck him a question that he wasn’t expecting.

  
_“Say Samu, if I die and you could, let’s say, rescue me from the underworld. Would you?”_

  
_Osamu’s mouth hung open, confused of what to answer his brother. “Of course I would. I think I’d do a good job of not looking back, if it’s you who’s following me back up.”_

  
_Atsumu laughs and extends his hand towards Osamu, who envelops it on his._

  
_“Samu, don’t go after me to the underworld okay? You’re not Orpheus, and not in any lifetime would I wish to be your Eurydice.”_

  
_Osamu’s breath hitched as tears started to form in his eyes. “Atsumu, what are you saying? Stop kidding around like that.”_

  
_“Promise me something Osamu.”_

  
_“Hey, stop that now.”_

  
_Atsumu’s eyes were now brimming with tears as he used his other hand to clasp Osamu’s hand._

  
_“Keep the house like this for me yeah? When I get to the other side, I’ll ask the hell out of them to let me visit the house on our birthdays yeah?”_

  
_Osamu had now broken down in tears, nodding in agreement to Osamu’s request._

  
_“You’ve gotten really good with your cooking Samu, so whip me one of your onigiri’s when I come visit yeah?”_

  
_Osamu felt his heart shatter into a million pieces. He wished to the heavens for a miracle, for anything that could save his dying brother’s life._

  
_“Say I love you to mom and dad for me yeah? Love ‘em like how I love you all. Yeah?”_

  
_Osamu nodded Atsumu’s voice now incomprehensible with all the sobbing they’ve been doing._

  
_“Always know I love you Samu, okay?”_

  
_“I know Tsum-tsum, I know.”_

  
Osamu rose from the bed and wiped his tears as he made his way down the kitchen. The rice was now cooked. He took the dried seaweed from the cupboard and with delicate hands, he started making an onigiri, one by one till all the rice was consumed, making a total of three.

  
Placing it on a plate, he put it in Atsumu’s seat and flashed his bravest smile as he sung in between sobs.

  
“Happy birthday Tsum-Tsum…  
Happy birthday Tsum-tsum…  
Happy birthday, happy birthday,  
Happy birthday… Tsum-tsum.”

  
He slumped on the floor and cried his heart out, his sobs and whimpers echoing in their empty house.

  
“Tsum-tsum… I miss you already. Why haven’t you visited the house at all? You liar. They didn’t let you out of there didn’t they? You must’ve replaced me with your spirit friends.

  
Tsum-tsum, I’m doing everything like I promised you. I kept the house the same way you wanted it too. Mom and dad? I love them like the best way you would’ve. I did all you made me promise to do, so where are you now? It’s been two years, yet you still didn’t visit me…” Osamu said, clenching his shirt in between sobs.

  
Osamu felt a warm breeze brush against his body, gentle like an embrace, and he looks up and there he was, bathed with a golden light, sitting on his usual spot on the dinner table, munching on one of his onigiris.

  
“Ya still make the best onigiris Samu.”


End file.
